Airventure 2024 | Day 5

July 21 | It’s a strange feeling, sitting here at Oshkosh beside my airplane and tent, thinking that there is a whole world of mine half a continent away, where my wife Catherine, my two dogs Tillie and Odie, my daughters and sons-in-law, my granddaughters, great granddaughters and great grandsons all wait for my return.

They all have their days filled with their activities, just as mine are filled with activities and new experiences. I’m glad to be here, but on the Sunday before Airventure actually starts, I’m already thinking of when I return home to all those loved ones that I miss already.

I was sitting around the fire pit at Brodhead last night feeling melancholy. The flight out is always both and adventure and a challenging task. The excitement of seeing old friends with shared experiences and common dreams makes the effort worthwhile. When the days filled with continuous activity are finally over, there is always a bit of sadness knowing that something so long anticipated is over.

I got up with the Brodhead Pietenpol dawn patrol for the last time this trip, broke camp and packed the airplane, washed my face and ate a quick breakfast, and was off in the air on the way to Oshkosh by eight o’clock. I had checked weather during breakfast and the report was clear skies and good visibility over Oshkosh.

I climbed to 3,500’ and headed on the course I plotted to keep me clear of the Madison controlled airspace and get me to the initial transition starting point at Ripon. The sky had a light morning haze that would soon burn off. As I got closer to Oshkosh, a few fluffy clouds appeared. The further I flew on my forty-five-minute flight, the closer together the clouds became, until I couldn’t see the ground.

If I had been on an instrument flight, I would have proceeded and just made an instrument approach, but with so many airplanes converging on Oshkosh, the controllers wouldn’t have been able to accommodate that. I was puzzled that the report had shown Oshkosh clear, but I turned back to clearer skies and flew down under the cloud bank, just like the old days of the airmail pilots.

The transition point had changed to Green Lake, and as I approached the skies opened up, sunny and clear. That explained that.

The approach and landing were a non-event after that. After landing on 36 left on the yellow dot, I exited the runway onto the grass and was progressively directed to my parking space well down in the south forty. It would be a long walk to the showers and tram stop, but I had arrived at Oshkosh once again.

I set up camp and made up my to-do list for the day and the week. I needed to register my airplane and campsite, register to volunteer again on the flight line, get my oxygen tank refilled, check out the Aeromart to see what was involved in getting the items Jim had donated but hadn’t sold at Brodhead into the sale tent, attend the training at Flight Ops for driving the flight line taxi and for parking airplanes, and find something to eat.

I almost got some of them done. Tomorrow will be another day for those chores, as well as for buying t-shirts for the great grandchildren, taking the Chapter 1268 sign I made with considerable help from my son-in-law Zac to the EAA Chapters Blue Barn for mounting, attend the Chapter leaders corn roast tomorrow evening, volunteer on the flight line in the morning, and maybe finding some good ice cream on the field.

I’ve been sitting here outside my tent as the sun sinks to the horizon, listening to Django Reinhart, Eddie Lang and other great 1920s and ‘30s Parisian café music on Pandora, just trying to take it all in. A B52 made a low pass over the field about an hour ago before landing, as did a World War II vintage B-29. Those were jus two of the steady stream of all types and sizes of airplanes that have been landing all day, including a few of the Pietenpols from Brodhead.

I think it’s just about time for a nice hot shower and bed. Tomorrow will be here soon enough.